I am a Westy owner who loves his '91 Westy purchased in '96.  It is in
excellent condition but we won't go into the money spent keeping it up or I
may not love it as much.

My wife and I also own a Prius and I think some correct information on the
Prius is in order.

The battery in the Prius is warranted for 8 years or 100,000 miles (10 years
and 150,000 miles in California).  Many, many people have over 200,000 miles
on a Prius (original battery) and one person has driven their Prius over
285,000 miles without replacing the battery.  And, the cost of a new battery
is falling.  It is now down to about $2,400 retail, which is down from about
$3,000.  Plus Toyota pays the dealer to turn any old battery (wrecked
vehicle) back to Toyota.

If you want facts and not speculation about the Prius battery, go to:
"http://www.toyota.com/html/hybridsynergyview/2006/fall/battery.html"

If you want to learn anything else about the Prius, go to a great users
group "http://priuschat.com/" and use the search engine for battery or any
other topic you desire.  You will be amazed at the lack of people who have
replaced a battery, or anything else on the vehicle for that matter.

We love our Westy and we also love our Prius, but each for different
reasons.

Harold
--
Harold & Faye Teer
1991 Westy
Harrisonburg, VA

On 6/28/07, Sudhir Desai <sudhir.desai@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > Priuses don't pay for
> > themselves either
>
> I would contend that dollar for dollar, a new Prius will cost much
> more in maintenance than a TDI converted vanagon, while giving
> relatively the same fuel economy (you cannnot truly compare a brick to
> a needle). I say this because after the batteries die, you're stuck
> with another $10k repair bill. On top of that, I'm sure California has
> strict heavy-metal disposal fees, which would increase the cost of the
> repair significantly.
>
> just my $.02 of heavily anti hybrid-as-"save the environment"-vehicle bias
> :D
>
> sudhir
>